An articulated vehicle that can be coupled from several parts is well known in the art. The parts of such an articulated vehicle are coupled together through a hinge connection. The hinge connection is bridged by a bellows, a connection gangway being provided to enable passengers to transit from one vehicle part to the other.
It is known that articulated trains or also articulated vehicles are subject to most disparate kinds of motions. The joints must be capable of absorbing all the roll, pitch and bending motions. In the present case, the term of joint comprises the entire hinged arrangement between two vehicle parts. Roll motions are understood to refer to movements during which the two vehicle parts are caused to rotate relative to each other about the longitudinal axis. Bending motions occur when the articulated vehicle negotiates a curve with the two vehicle parts whilst pitch movements occur when such an articulated train travels over a hill or through a depression.
For negotiating curves and e.g., for travelling through a depression, a known hinge connection between the vehicle parts comprises an articulated and a pitch joint. The pitch joint allows movement of the two vehicle parts relative to each other about an axis transverse to the longitudinal axis of the vehicle. Usually, the pitch bearings provided for this purpose are configured to be metal rubber bearings.
Hitherto, one assumed that, due to the inherent elasticity of the chassis of the respective vehicle parts, the roll motions were absorbed by the chassis itself. One had any reason to believe this because the roll angles were 3° at the most. In the meantime however, it has been found out that even with such quite small roll angles, torques of up to 35 kNm act onto the hinge or also onto the chassis. Insofar, damage to the chassis and/or the joint cannot be excluded. In particular the articulated joint, which makes it possible for an articulated train to negotiate a curve, is subject to heavy loads. This is reflected by the fact that roller bearings of considerable dimensions have to be mounted in the region of the articulated joint, said bearing finally not only transmitting the fifth-wheel load between the car sections but also being capable of transmitting the forces occurring during the already explained roll movements.
In this context, the document DE 10 2006 050 210.8 already describes how to connect the articulated joint, which is a constituent part of the hinge, to the one vehicle part through a hinge arrangement in order to transmit pitch and roll movements. This means the hinge incorporates two hinge elements, namely an articulated joint and one additional hinge element, which transmits pitch and roll movements. Since such a hinge arrangement allows for transmitting pitch and roll movements, both the loads on the chassis of the two vehicle parts and on the hinge itself can be avoided. The reason therefore is that finally, through the articulated joint, only the fifth-wheel load and the tensile force as well as a small roll torque of <10 kNm have to be transmitted. Hitherto, the articulated joint comprises roller bearings of considerable dimensions. Considering that the forces acting onto the articulated bearing are not considerably lower thanks to the hinge construction found, other bearings may be utilized, which are considerably less expensive than the roller bearings used hitherto, which are of very large dimensions.
Furthermore, an articulated bearing is known from DE 11 33 749, said bearing being provided with two superimposed forks which, as a part of the articulated joint, receive each, between the forks, one bearing plate of the other part of the articulated joint. For connecting the respective fork and the bearing plate, threaded through bolts are provided. One of the two forks has, between its leg and the bearing plate, what are referred to as adjusting washers acting in a way similar to so-called thrust washers. The legs of the joint are hereby tensioned against the adjusting washers. The result thereof is that the thrust washers are irregularly loaded since the legs of the fork will taper slightly conically after having been tensioned through the threaded bolt since the forks are made from one piece. This causes the edges to be pressed against the adjusting washers, which leads to early wear of the bearing.